The $16.65 billion settlement by Bank of America over financial crisis-era mortgage securities highlights a pattern of the government extorting the banks, said Dick Kovacevich, former Wells Fargo chairman and CEO.

Royal Bank of Scotland said on Wednesday it had reached a settlement allowing it to use a key piece of software in its trade finance business that a U.S. judge had prevented the bank from using due to copyright infringement.

Goldman Sachs, which cut the portion of revenue set aside for pay the past two years, will increase 2015 salaries for junior employees in the U.S. by about 20%, according to a person briefed on the decision.

A $300m fine on Standard Chartered for lapses in anti-money laundering controls has piled pressure on the bank's board, coming after a series of transgressions and a drop in earnings that had prompted calls for change at the top.

Investment-banking fees in Europe, growing faster than in Asia and the Americas, are set to reach a seven-year high as sales of debt and stock and a buoyant U.K. economy outweigh stagnant income from trading.

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Jefferies Group is reorganizing businesses that help fund corporate deals, elevating senior investment banker Jim Walsh to oversee its leveraged finance unit as Kevin Lockhart leaves, according to people with knowledge of the matter.